On "Kingfisher," the album's centerpiece, they prove when it's perfectly balanced with a subtle instrumental approach. [No. 138, p.61]

The nine songs blur together over the 36 minutes, and they offer few surprises once you enter their heavy-handed world. [No. 138, p.58]

The vocals are random, directionless moans and the open-ended delivery hardly screams, "Listen to me again!" [No. 138, p.53]

The most psychedelic moments on the album come during the long instrumental fades on tunes like "Silence Can Say So Much," "Cast The First Stone" and "Love Is Like A Spinning Wheel," but the middy instrumentals mix often mashes the sounds together into an indistinguishable pulsation of spacey sci-fi noise. [No. 137, p.55]

As 1991 albums go, Out Of time in its own way is an era-defining as Nevermind, Loveless or Spiderland. [No. 137, p.58]

Only the last song, Wild Sun's straightforward, vulnerable take on "Easy Way Out," finally hits the mark. [No. 137, p.61]

Spektor's knack for orchestral arrangement is more vivid than her writing here. [No. 137, p.61]

Too frequently, though, the new material doesn't have the constitution to withstand the heavy hand of producer and former Dawes guitarist Blake Mills. [No. 137, p.55]

About 45 seconds into song after song, the chorus punches in loudly--predictably and, ultimately, annoyingly. [No. 135, p.57]

There's melody and rhythm, but mostly the overtones float through the ether, seldom resolving into anything approaching a song, although the overall effect is soothing and dreamy. [No. 135, p.54]

Vacancy has a more organic, "big indie rock" real feel to it as opposed to something automatically designed to blast from convertibles and iPods in high-school lockers. [No. 134, p.53]

"No Future V" and "Stable Boy" benefit from amping up the electricity and volume, which makes S+@dium Rock a solid TMLT companion piece but not a primary choice. [No. 134, p.61]

The songs have a somber, ambient feel, even on tunes with uplifting subjects. [No. 134, p.57]

The combination here of light electronic production, show-stopping African vocals, Mumford harmonies and heart-on-your-sleeve pop is hard not to love. [No. 133, p.59]

Much of Cistern feels deliberately nebulous, washed-out and distended. [No. 133, p.55]

Haden can find that sweet, glacial pace that makes a song seem both inevitable and important. But his deliberate delivery of lines such as "Oh the Depression, it ruined us, it ruined us, it ruined us" can be distracting and turn songs into history lessons. [No. 132, p.59]

As usual, it's mostly successful as a mood piece. [No. 132, p.57]

Atomic offers rare glimpses into the band's writing process and exists as an anomaly in Mogwai's catalog that's sure to intrigue diehard fans, but offers little more to anyone else. [No. 132, p.57]

It's a bit mad, but what else would you expect from the Melvins, which in-and-of -itself is a shame. [No. 132, p.55]

As meticulously milquetoast as the entirety of this is, there are deadly sharp adult contemporary hooks on "Over & Over" and "The Pin," though the pervasive electronic beats, the obnoxious layer of acoustic strumming and raise-your-beer-and-hum choruses are symbols of a band lock-stepping in with whatever goes over best with casual listeners. [No. 132, p.55]

It's an established formula: Regression to the mean is inevitable. That said, there are plenty of familiar pleasures for those who investigate. [No. 131, p.56]

Most disappointing about PersonA is that it oscillates between gutsy and lazy. [No. 131, p.51]

His penchant for quirky arrangements remains in place, as does his gift for shrewd lyrics and dark, ironic humor. [No. 130, p.55]

Hold/Still tries so hard to be ominous that it almost always forgets to be interesting. [No. 130, p.61]

There's enough here to keep diehard Coral heads satisfied, but a little more of the band's mercurial waywardness would've been welcome. [No. 130, p.55]

The album kicks off with an accomplished, but by-the-numbers nod to T. Rex/'70s glam, then proceeds to genre-jump through the filter of neo-alt-country/Americana in a well-done, but regrettably innocuous fashion. [No. 128, p.53]

There's a lingering, forced feel and more than a few questionable stylistic decisions. [No. 128, p.55]

The lyrics are often buried in the mix. [No. 128, p.61]